Once upon a time there were five little hens. They lived in a little wooden hut in a wood. A nice family of humans had adopted them, made meals and cleaned for them. Every time the family cleaned the hut, they made sure there was a fresh copy of the Financial Times on the floor for the hens to read while they were resting at home.
Sometimes, the family went on holiday, and then they asked their neighbours Margaret and Malcolm to take over housekeeping duties. Every night at 8 o’clock, these servants-next-door popped round, made sure the hens were in bed, and shut the hut door firmly.
One night one of the hens, Little Bad Hen, decided not to go home. She was having such fun in the woods, grubbing for windfalls and worms: and besides, it was still light. Nobody had told her that Mr. Fox lived nearby, and had hungry cubs to feed. Luckily for her, nobody had told Mr. Fox that Little Bad Hen was out and about. She got away with it, and came scuttling back as soon as one of the servants-next-door appeared to serve breakfast the following morning.
Little Bad Hen.
Little Bad Hen kept this up for four whole nights, clucking smugly to herself as she heard the servants-next-door scurrying about the woods, peering under logs and into hidey-holes searching for her. On the fifth evening, it rained. Little Bad Hen looked up at the sky. She considered the secret-but-chilly and damp shelter that she’d found, under little Felix’s toy wheelbarrow. Perhaps that wooden hut, where she could cuddle up to her friends and sisters was a better idea after all. She might even think about laying those servants-next-door an egg.
Kipling Hall. The audience enjoys a picnic ahead of the evening performance.
I’m a bit of a Handlebards groupie. Handlebards? Yes, the always effervescently inventive troupe (one male combo of four actors, one female combo of four actors) who cycle the country carrying all they need with them to one-night-only venues, in the grounds of stately homes, museums, city parks to present their season’s Shakespeare play in the open air, come rain, come shine.
I’ve been to five productions now, two male, two female, and one … well, we’ll come to that in a minute.
One night was so wet that players and audience alike took refuge in a castle keep. One evening was bright and sunny, as was another, if a little windy. Last year was fine until after the interval. Then the heavens opened. We were well-provided with rain gear but got utterly soaked anyway. The players, their hair plastered to their scalps and water streaming down their faces, their clothes sodden, dripping and rendered translucent by the unremitting downpour played on. What a team! We admired their grit, and retired home to peel off every item of sodden clothing (and that included underclothes) and take a hot shower. The actors camped out on a hard floor, got up the following morning and cycled to their next venue.
Covid 19 put a stop to this year’s plans. No male tour. No female tour. The actors didn’t sit around twiddling their thumbs though. The London-based ones set about organising deliveries of essentials to the vulnerable and shielded. Which was wonderful, but not acting.
Three of the Handlebards share a house: They’re their very own Social Bubble. So during the days of Lockdown they hatched a plot to tour a play during August and September, just the three of them: two men, one woman. They chose Romeo and Juliet. No problem. Aside from Romeo and Juliet themselves, they only have to play Mercutio, Benvolio, Capulet, Tybalt, Juliet’s nurse and her mother, Friar Laurence …
These kinds of difficulty never thwart the Handlebards. Hats and wigs temporarily stand in for characters whose actor is currently multi-tasking. Props are minimal. Bicycle pumps for weapons; an aerosol; a hand-painted sun and moon; a repurposed squash-up play tunnel becomes Juliet’s balcony; a couple of military jackets; a length of hessian to stand in for monkish robes; gauzy stuff for Juliet; lengths of red ribbon for blood and guts and they’re pretty much sorted.
Boy meets girl. Romeo and Juliet.
Juliet’s giddy and in love.
She disappears under her own balcony.
Here’s Friar Laurence.
Juliet’s nurse has just found Juliet … dead.
The actors change roles, sometimes almost mid sentence. A Liverpudlian becomes a Scot who becomes someone who has twubble with his ‘r’s. Romeo and Juliet themselves are played by a man and a woman respectively, but who knew that Juliet’s nurse sports a dapper beard, or her mother blue knee-socks?
We went along to Thursday evening’s performance. It was all tremendously rip-roaring fun, played against the backdrop of the lovely Jacobean Kiplin Hall. We took chairs, a picnic, and lots of warm clothes, because it was chilly. As ever, laughter and sheer delight kept us entirely in the moment, so we barely noticed that it started to drizzle, not long before the end. Thank you Handlebards. Live theatre is back.
This really is a challenge. Photos demonstrating 3D. Showing the heft, the mass, the solidity of the main subject: putting it in the perspective of its surroundings.
I took myself to Fountains Abbey and Studley Royal. Here is an ancient Cistercian foundation, in ruins since the days when Henry VIII called for the Dissolution of the Monasteries. Here are Georgian water gardens, developed by John and William Aislabie in the 18th century. And here I found my subjects.
Glance through this arch to see where the monks came, eight times a day, for worship.Huby’s Tower can be glimpsed through the mighty weathered arches of the now roofless Abbey church.
Much of what you find in the gardens is more playful. This balustrade overlooking the lake, shows icicles. ‘It’s summer now’, is the message. ‘Enjoy yourselves. Winter will be along soon enough.’
This young pheasant has found the Banqueting House. Outside is a lawn cut into the shape of a coffin. The message is similar. ‘Eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow we die’*
And later, explore the woodlands of the High Ride and its ancient trees. Their roots are pretty solid.
Ah, how idyllic … Bolton Castle in Wensleydale. Perfect for a summer’s day out.
Not if you were Mary Queen of Scots though. She spent six months imprisoned here in 1568. Although even that incarceration was relative. She was attended by 30 of her household, which included knights, servants, ladies-in-waiting, cooks, grooms, a hairdresser, an embroiderer, an apothecary, a physician and a surgeon. The remaining 20 or so lodged in the nearby village of Castle Bolton. She went hunting. She had her hair done. She learnt English, since up to this point she could speak only Scots, French and Latin.
From Pyrenees to Pennines 
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